Florida Sports Wires

Penske Porsches setting pace for possible third consecutive victory PHOTOS BY DON COBLE The No. 7 and No. 6 Penske Porsche 963 GT Prototypes showed a lot of early speed at the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona at the Daytona International Speedway.   DAYTONA BEACH –  Drivers had to deal with a lot of unknowns in the first four hours of the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona sports car race.   F irst, Michelin brought a new tire compound that made the rear tires dance most of the way around the  3.56-mile Daytona  International Speedway road  course that includes a twisting, flat section in the infield and  a significant portion  of the high-banked superspeedway .   Temperatures were in the low 40s during a three-day test session at the ROAR Before the 24 at Daytona a week earlier, but they approached  nearly 80  degrees  at the start of the twice-around-the-clock marathon on Saturday at 1:40 p.m.   A nother issue for 58 of the 60 teams w a...

PHOTO COURTESY OF IMSA The Acura ARX-06 driven by Renger van der Zande was moved up to the pole position for Saturday's Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona after the Cadillac V-Series.R failed inspection late Thursday. DAYTONA BEACH – Renger van der Zande’s Acura ARX-06 already made a significant pass for the lead nearly two days before the start of the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona sports car race at the Daytona International Speedway. The GT Prototype was moved from second to the pole position late Thursday after the No. 31 Cadillac V-Series.R driven by Jack Aitken failed post qualifying inspection with a rear friction skid block was ground down too far, making it too low. Van der Zande will share the driving duties with Nick Yelloly, Alex Palou and Kaku Ohta in the Meyer Shank Racing with Curb Agajanian car. The driving tandem comes from the Netherlands, Great Britian, Spain and Japan. The Acura was clocked at 136.281 mph on the 3.56-mile road course that utilizes a twisting, flat infie...

Coble: Aitken steers No. 31 Cadillac to Rolex 24 at Daytona pole position  January 22, 2026   DAYTONA BEATCH – Jack Aitken proved his Cadillac V-Series.R was really fast for one lap during pole qualifying on Thursday for the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona. Now comes the biggest challenge: can it survive a twice-around-the clock marathon on the 3.56-mile Daytona International Speedway’s road course? In what most endurance drivers consider the least most significant task of the grueling race, Aitken’s prototype was clocked at 136.429 mph, a fraction of a second quicker than the Acura ARX-06 of Alex Palou (136.281 mph) and another Cadillac driven by Jordan Taylor (136.240). One lap around the circuit that combines a flat, twisting infield road course and the majority of the high-banked speedway wasn’t much of a challenge, Aiken said, especially since the record winning distance in 2020 was 833 laps – 2,965.48 miles. “With qualifying here, it's a little bit going into the u...

  The shock is over, and the proverbial smoke has cleared. The Jaguars can start to look ahead t0 2026.  Liam Coen’s first year at the helm gave the Jacksonville faithful the first few pages of a new chapter in franchise history in which they can now be considered as perennial AFC South title contenders. Trevor Lawrence may have finally unlocked the door to his long-awaited generational talent and also being among the league quarterback elite class. Based on his playoff exit against Buffalo, we’ll wait and see.  Anthony Campanile regenerated the much-maligned defense -notably the secondary - and quickly gained respect as a defensive coordinator to the point of getting interviews for head coaching jobs. Low-profile offensive coordinator Grant Udinski is on the Browns’ list of potential head coaching candidates, and he also has been mentioned as the Eagles’ possible new OC. Cam Little has become an instant thought as a three-point option from more than 60 yards away.  ...